Mississippi agriculture official expected to go to US Senate

March 20, 2018 at 11:45 p.m. | Updated March 20, 2018 at 11:45 p.m.

by Associated Press

FILE - In this July 27, 2017, file photo Mississippi Commissioner of Agriculture and Commerce Cindy Hyde-Smith speaks at the Neshoba County Fair in Philadelphia, Miss. The state's governor will appoint Hyde-Smith as Mississippi's first female member of Congress to fill the Senate vacancy that will soon be created when Sen. Thad Cochran retires, three state Republicans told The Associated Press on Tuesday, March 20, 2018. (AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis, File)
FILE - In this July 27, 2017, file photo Mississippi Commissioner of Agriculture and Commerce Cindy Hyde-Smith speaks at the Neshoba County Fair in Philadelphia, Miss. The state's governor will appoint Hyde-Smith as Mississippi's first female member of Congress to fill the Senate vacancy that will soon be created when Sen. Thad Cochran retires, three state Republicans told The Associated Press on Tuesday, March 20, 2018. (AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis, File)

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) - Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant is expected to appoint state Agriculture Commissioner Cindy Hyde-Smith to succeed a longtime U.S. senator who is resigning because of poor health.

Bryant scheduled an announcement Wednesday in Hyde-Smith's hometown of Brookhaven. Three state Republican sources have told The Associated Press that he chose the 58-year-old Hyde-Smith to succeed Sen. Thad Cochran, who is 80, is stepping down April 1. The sources spoke Tuesday on condition of anonymity because the announcement was not yet official.

Hyde-Smith would immediately begin campaigning for a Nov. 6 nonpartisan special election to fill the rest of Cochran's term, which expires in January 2020.

She won a state Senate seat in 1999 as a Democrat, then switched to the GOP in late 2010 and was elected agriculture commissioner in 2011.

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